‘Or Chelsea.’

‘I’m longing to move,’ says Judith; then, as if this confession might be construed as an ulterior motive that detracts from the romance of Jomier’s suggestion, she adds: ‘to start afresh.’

‘With me?’

‘Of course with you.’ She snuggles up, her head on his chest. Jomier likes this. Or he thinks he likes it. Tilly had never snuggled up like this. Not with him. Perhaps with Max. Jomier strokes Judith’s hair. It is thinning but she is far from bald.

‘Could you put up with Ophelia?’ asks Judith.

‘I’m getting quite used to Ophelia,’ says Jomier.

‘And what about Henry and Sandra?’

‘What about them?’

‘Won’t they disapprove?’

‘I don’t think so. Why should they?’ He asks the question and at once comes up with one or two answers. Will this cohabitation lead to marriage? Will Jomier’s equity in the new house pass on his death to Judith? Will that transfer be for her lifetime or outright? Will Henry and Louisa see their inheritance spent on rehab for Judith’s children?

Judith shrugs. ‘I don’t know. They might not like it.’

‘I should think they’ll both be relieved,’ says Jomier, ‘to think there’ll be someone else to push me around Holland Park in a wheelchair.’

‘Or the Chelsea Physic Garden,’ says Judith.

‘Or the Chelsea Physic Garden,’ repeats Jomier.

‘Not quite yet, I hope,’ says Judith.

Jomier squeezes her lycra-clad knee. ‘Not quite yet.’

Jomier returns from Venice a happy man. Even the ghastliness of the return journey on Ryanair – vaporetto to the Piazzale Roma, bus to Treviso Airport, more sheep dip, more sardines – does not pollute the happy feeling that he loves and is loved. As if to prove that their plans are well founded, providence finds them two adjacent seats on the plane. Judith is reading an Ian Rankin thriller that she bought at Treviso Airport: Jomier estimates that she has read six novels since they left London while he is only on page 137 of Senilità. This no longer irritates him. Why should it irritate him? How much better a woman buried in a novel than a woman holding forth. He thinks Judith is perfect or as perfect as he can reasonably expect. Certainly, she is second-hand but then the brand-new Tilly proved unreliable. So too his Golf. That was also new and proved problematic. Jomier sees himself as a man in a car lot suddenly finding a model he has always longed for. A gull-wing Mercedes. One of those big-bonneted old Volvos or a curvy two-stroke Saab.